Continued proliferation of long range missiles and the fielding of sophisticated threats, such as the maneuvering re-entry vehicle, pose challenges for the fielded Ballistic Missile Defense System (BMDS) weapon systems. However, as missile defense has evolved from World War II to the present day, the advent of the digital age and the emergence of a wide variety of non-kinetic techniques create asymmetric opportunities to augment the BMDS to assist in negation of ballistic missile threats and to rapidly inject intelligence surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) actionable decision aids into the often stressful offensive and defensive battle operations.
Kinetic techniques involve projectile weapons (e.g., such as guns, missiles, and bombs) that destroy targets by kinetic effects (e.g., overpressure, projectile, shrapnel and spalling damage, and incendiary effects). Kinetic weapons may use stored chemical energy in propellants and warhead explosives and deliver this energy to a target by means of a projectile of some kind.
Non-kinetic techniques involve digital and electronic weapons that generally do not induce direct physical harm to people. For example, non-kinetic techniques include cyber, electronic warfare (EW), and decoys. Cyber weapons are delivered digitally and attack target systems via computer software. Electronic warfare weapons attack systems via signals and energy. Electronic warfare weapons include direct energy (DE) weapons that deliver a large amount of stored energy from the weapon to the target, to produce structural and incendiary damage effects; high-power microwave signals; charge particle beams; and high energy lasers. Decoys are defense measures that direct the enemy threat safely away from the primary target.
Currently, there are analytical solutions to provide performance assessment of the kinetic solutions. For example, probability of single shot engagement kill, PSSEK, which is a measure the effectiveness that is used in these analytical approaches, is derived considering only kinetic means to neutralize the ballistic missile threat. PSSEK factors in the reliability of the combat system, the reliability of the interceptor, and the ability of the interceptor to intercept the re-entry vehicle (RV) of the missile. PSSEK expresses the reliability of the combat system operating correctly, and the probability of the interceptor neutralizing the threat.
In addition to the probabilistic approach to characterizing PSSEK, there have been scoring systems developed to assess vulnerabilities of kinetic weapons (e.g. missiles). These systems prioritize vulnerabilities and identify those that pose the greatest risk. One such scoring system is the common vulnerability scoring system (CVSS) that provides an open framework within which to score vulnerabilities. CVSS provides standardized vulnerability scores. When an organization normalizes vulnerability scores across its software and hardware platforms, it can leverage a vulnerability management policy. This policy may be similar to a service level agreement (SLA) that states how quickly a particular vulnerability must be validated and remediated.
However, the current methods to create tools to attack vulnerabilities with a high rate of success can take months to create. Furthermore, there are no prior or existing solutions from which to build an effective response to the cyber threat to include elements of deterrence, mission assurance and offensive cyber capabilities.